beyondBeijing2008.com

Barry Keller is a hydrogeophysicst who has a home in Pichilemu, a beach town in central Chile known as a surfer’s paradise. He shares this FirstPerson report:We were at home during the quake at 3:34 a.m. local time. There were very strong motions for about a minute. Our house in Pichilemu is a four-story (counting [...]

By Adrienne Mong, NBC News ProducerZhangjiajie, Hunan Province — It was an interesting formula.
“One Japanese tourist spends the same as two Korean tourists,” said Wang Ai Ming, an official from the Hunan tourism bureau.  “And one Korean spends as much as three Chinese tourists.”
Unfortunately for our minor functionary from Zhangjiajie, the Japanese and especially [...]

Tuesday, March 2
How a young girl prevented a larger tragedy in Robinson Crusoe island | 1:30 p.m. ET
Local papers are telling the story of how a 12-year-old’s quick thinking might have saved  the residents of Robinson Crusoe, an island about 400 miles off the coast of Chile named after the fictional sailor.
Martina Maturana felt as slight tremor and [...]

Wednesday, March 3
Puppy rescued from collapsed house in Constitucion | 11:53 a.m. ET
People weren’t the only victims of the earthquake in Chile.
Rescue worker Cristian Velasquez found and comforted this puppy found alive Monday. Velasquez gave him bits of food and water after rescuing him from inside a collapsed house in Constitucion.
(AP Photo/ Roberto Candia)
(AP Photo/ [...]

By Bo Gu, NBC News Producer
Chinese netizens went into somewhat of a tizzy last week when they discovered their president had set up an account on the microblogging section of www.people.com.cn, the Web portal of the People’s Daily, the official mouthpiece of Communist Party of China.
With no advance notice or publicity, his name and title [...]